‘Doctor Who': Five Doctors unite for an anniversary audio drama

The 50th anniversary celebration of “Doctor Who” is just beginning and Whovians are getting a nice big present in the form of a 100-minute audio drama starring five of the surviving Doctors.

“Doctor Who: The Light at the End” will be released in November and will star Tom Baker, Peter Davison, Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy and Paul McGann. That’s Doctors 4 through 8 for those who came to the adventure series only after his revival in 2005 with Doctor No. 9 (Christopher Eccleston).

But the Doctors aren’t the only classic characters making a return. Their companions are also joining them: Louise Jameson as Leela, Sarah Sutton as Nyssa, Nicola Bryant as Peri, Sophie Aldred as Ace and India Fisher as Charley Pollard.

And for the villain, Geoffrey Beevers is reprising his role as the evil Time Lord, the Master.

The drama is being produced by Big Finish, the British-based creators of audio dramas featuring characters from “Dark Shadows,” “Sherlock Holmes” and “Highlander,” among others. They’ve been doing “Doctor Who” adventures featuring the classic Doctors since 1999.

“We wanted to do a proper, fully-fledged multi-Doctor story for this very special occasion,” writer, director and executive producer Nicholas Briggs said in a statement, “and it’s wonderful that all the surviving Doctors threw themselves behind the project so enthusiastically. That’s not to say the first three Doctors don’t appear — we wanted to pay homage to the whole history of the classic series.”

Talking to Hero Complex in December, McCoy credited the Big Finish “Doctor Who” dramas for stirring up enough interest to bring it back to TV in 2005.

“They kept it alive, and then you know, suddenly someone with a bit of an imagination came along and said, ‘Yes, I’ve been listening to these ‘Doctor Whos,’ and they work. We should have these back on television,’ ” McCoy said.

The drama will be released on a two-disc standard edition and a five-disc special edition with extra documentaries.

If it wasn't for Big Finish audio productions, there would probably be no TV series. They deserve more respect for that alone. Life long fans have been waiting half their lives for Tom Baker to return to the audio dramas. With the right direction and good writing, I'm sure they can pull it together and raise the bar for the 50th Anniversary reunion.